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The new type of thermal head with an electroless Ni-W-P film on a polyimide film substrate was investigated for the purpose of low cost and low energy consumption. The electroless plating method attained a fine patterned heating element and the polyimide substrate worked as a heat-insulating layer with a lower heat conductivity. In our simulation, the applied power was reduced about 50% by using polyimide film as the heat-insulating layer. The accumulation of heat could be suppressed by controlling the polyimide film thickness without reducing the advantage of low energy consumption. The new head, composed of screen-printed polyimide resin with SiC powder (10 ~m thick) as the protective layer, an electroless Ni-W-P film (0.25 i~m thick) as the heating element, a polyimide film (50 i~m thick) as the heat-insulating layer, and an A1 board (3.0 mm) as the heat sink, was produced. The new head shows the same dot size as that of the conventional thin-film-type head produced by vacuum technology, and its cost is lower than that of the conventional thin-film-type head. The new head produces the good printing quality with 60% of the power required by the conventional one. Therefore, the new head provides low cost and low energy consumption.

The magnetic and electric properties of electroless Ni–P films after heat treatment are investigated as a function of the P content in the deposit. The residual Ni, which means the surplus Ni (crystallized Ni) after Ni3P formation, is confirmed to determine the film properties of resistivity and saturation magnetization. Moreover, they depend only on the P content and are independent of the preparation conditions. The saturation magnetization, M s, and the reciprocal of resistivity, ρ-1, are proportional to the amount of the residual Ni after sufficient heat treatment. An equation, showing the correlation between the P content and the resistivity or magnetization of the deposit after sufficient heat treatment, is proposed on the basis of the characters of ferromagnetic and metallic conductivity of the residual Ni matrix.

Plasma etching of ITO (In2O3:Sn indium tin oxide) thin films has been performed using a CH4/H2 plasma. Etching occurs above a substrate temperature (T s) of 60°C and the etch rate increases with increasing T s, while amorphous like or polymer-like carbon deposits onto the ITO films below 60°C. The apparent activation energy of the etching is 4.12 kcal/mol (0.18 eV). This small activation energy suggests that the desorption of produced volatiles is the rate-limiting process. Fine ITO patterns (1.5 µmL/S) were obtained using this gas mixture.

ratio of 12/1 be employed for silox CVD processing. (iii)The deposition rate decrease with increased flow of nitrogen is attributed to two factors, depression of the sil,ane partial pressure and lowering of the wafer surface temperature.